Data loss is a fact of life - you drop your phone, it hits the ground, shatters to pieces, and chances are you lost the majority of your data on the device. Thankfully, we have services like iCloud that automatically backup your data, making it easily retrievable in the case of a shattered or damaged smartphone.

Unfortunately, it isn't the best solution for backing up data, particularly because Apple just isn't the best when it comes to cloud services. Security is a big concern with iCloud, and if you ever want to get more storage, it's quite pricey compared to competitors. The company also gives you a mere 5GB of cloud storage that it's hardly possible to backup all of the pertinent data on your iOS device, especially if you have a large photo library full of special moments you want to keep.

That said, there are plenty of other ways to make sure your data is safe by backing up your files across a few free services. The first step is, of course, making sure you have a backup of your device on your PC or MacBook.

Think Kit is a new addition to Paper, a popular and free iPad app for sketching notes and drawing. Think Kit offers tools for creating diagrams, flowcharts, and mind maps. Within Think Kit you will find a Diagram tool for drawing straight lines, connecting lines, and drawing shapes. The Fill tool in Think Kit allows you to color the shapes in your diagrams. Think Kit's cut tool makes it easy to cut and move shapes in your diagrams.

It’s one of the most versatile devices in the history of… well… devices. The tablet has changed the landscape of classrooms around the world, from flipped learning to augmented reality.

A much needed balance between function and affordability, tablets of all shapes and sizes are being embraced by teachers in millions of different ways. In the below infographic from Early Childhood Education Degrees present an overview of how this shift is taking place.

You bought your iPad new three years ago, and now it’s getting a bit long in the tooth.

Opening apps can take forever. Sometimes they crash, stop responding, or won’t open to begin with. If you want to extend the life of your little glass rectangle–and make your iPad faster in general–the following tips can help. And all of these tips are simple(ish)–nothing crazy like jail-breaking or changing hardware.

"Welcome to this April post and the eighth in a series of posts that will bring you over 70 STEM links. As promised with this posting, I have provided over 70 amazing STEM possibilities… in fact the count is at 80! "

Part 1 Then click here to see those first ten.Part 2 Now up to 20 resourcesPart 3 Check out these 10 to make 30Part 4 A list that now supplies up to 40 STEM sitesPart 5 An amazing 50 STEM sites.Part 6 Now at 60 sites and more to comePart 7 Click here as we get closer to 80 STEM sites

I am on spring break this week. It has been such a luxury to linger over coffee and the newspaper in the mornings. That has been about all of the luxury I’ve been able to enjoy because even though I’m on spring break from my job, I am not on spring break from doctoral classes. I have been immersed in scholarly articles on early literacy. So, while this is all fresh on my mind, I am going to share a few work samples from some of our recent literacy activities on iPads.

Evernote users are about to have more reasons to make the service a central hub for their digital lives. Today, the company is announcing Scannable, an app that will scan any document you have and upload it to their service. Better yet, your scanned documents are also searchable via Evernote, so you can find them alter on. You’ll also be able to send the documents along via just about any digital means you like. Images are automatically rotated, cropped and adjusted , too.

The apps below represent 52 (which conveniently works out to about one per week if you want to try them that way) of the best apps for your classroom. There are apps that help teachers gather data, scan exams, contact parents, promote research, keep notes, share documents, or even flip your classroom in 2015.

BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) is not only about students bringing their own devices to class and using them for educational purposes. It is much more than just a problem of hardware but is rather a question of what "learningware" students need to install and use with their devices. Most of the discussions on BYOD center around the accessibility and availability of devices together with the fact that students are experts of their own devices. Sounds good but not enough!

Students need to be provided powerful educational apps to galvanize the learning gen inside of them. They need to be shown what apps work with which. Below is a Symbalo board featuring a wide variety of powerful web tools and apps perfect for BYOD classrooms. Click on the image below to access the interactive version of this board where you can access the links of each of these apps.

In iOS8 and OS Yosemite, Apple introduced a new feature which allows you to answer phone calls on your iPad and your MacBook. While this is a cool feature, I don't really see the necessity of it, since you pretty much have your phone with you at all times, or at least most people I know do.

"I enjoy discussing iPad and other edtech resources with my colleague and friend Sylvia Duckworth almost every week through Twitter. Sylvia is a leader in the French teaching community in Canada, and has created an enormous amount of resources for language teachers to use. I asked her if she wanted to collaborate on this post, and she quickly agreed to do so. Below is a list of iPad apps that we both use in our language classrooms. The ones marked with an * are the essential, must-have ones. We have divided the list into two categories: Content consumption apps and content creation apps."

SeeSaw, a powerful and popular iPad app for creating digital portfolios, is now available as a Chrome web app and as an Android app. The new apps allow students to create and add content to digital portfolios.

Through SeeSaw students can add artifacts to their portfolios by taking pictures of their work (in the case of a worksheet or other physical item), by writing about what they've learned, or by uploading a short video about things they have learned. The SeeSaw apps students can add voice comments to their pictures to clarify what their pictures document. Students can create folders withing their accounts to organize content from multiple subject areas.

The following is a list of Google Apps for iOS (from Google, Inc. and third parties). This list is exhaustive and includes several apps that are not on the infographic Guide to Google Apps for the iPad. Some of these have natural classroom integration, and some are more for personal or business use. Some are optimized for both iPad and iPhone, some are only optimized for iPhone. Each app title is linked directly to the App Store so you can click directly from your device to download each app.

"With the release of iOS8 Apple allowed third parties to make keyboards that can be installed on your iPad. If you are a science teacher, or for some other reason need to type subscripts or superscripts, one of the easiest ways to do this now, is to install Chemistry Keyboard ($3.79)"

Today's list features some interesting grading apps that you can use on your iPad to grade your students assignments. Some of these apps have also web based platforms where you can export and share your graded work with students. The apps will also enable you to provide feedback to your students and see what they are actually working on.

Using iMovie App in Physical Education Lessons - November 2014

This month I have been supporting the PE department with using the iPads to enhance their lessons and pupils to analyse skills. Last year Apple updated iMovie app to include features such as Split Screen, Freeze Frame, Video Speed etc. This year the update has made some of these features a little easier to find.

Split Screen: We have used this to compare videos of the same skill taken from two different angles. For example, a cricket bowling action.

Video Speed: We have used this by splitting part of a clip where the skill is most demonstrated and slowing it down.

Freeze Frame: We can stop a clip at any point and create a freeze frame. This freeze frame can be split at either end to create a separate clip and textual analysis added.

I would also like to say a big thank you for all the great feedback to the iPad Teachers App. We are only at the start of the content we can add to this so look out for the first update in mid December with even more ideas. Details of the app can be found at www.ipadteachers.co.uk

I appreciate @John Evans for sharing this on his Scoop.it page "iPad in Education". As I work with preservice students, those in certain fields claim technology is not an option as they don't understand integration. With this article, I can provide my students another first hand example of how PE and technology blend.

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